Published: July 19, 2008 12:22 am            

Preserving part of city history may be possible

By saving cut sandstone, brick facade of two floors of old Elks Building

FAIRMONT — Saving only the cut sandstone and brick facade of the first two floors of the old Elks Building, also known as Skinnner’s Tavern, may be the best way to preserve part of the city’s history, say architects and engineers who have examined the six-story building.

The building is actually two structures, erected in stages in 1903 and 1904 as additions to the original Skinner’s Tavern. The original wooden tavern and rooming house opened in 1847, before the first suspension bridge across the Monongahela River was built nearby.

From lodging traveling salesmen, merchants and others from before the Civil War and through the Industrial Age to sheltering thousands and thousands of railroad passengers in later decades, the old hotel played a key role in the city’s growth. From the early 1940s on, it also was a fraternal, social and cultural center for the city’s black community.

Saving the two-story front facade would be much less costly than attempting to restore the structure, according to field surveys done in 2004 and 2006. Weather-related damage has all but ruled out such an attempt anyway, the surveys state.

Keeping the facade will save “an exceptional example of Beaux Arts/Italian Renaissance Revival architecture with an extraordinary level of brick and stone masonry craftsmanship rarely found today,” states a July 7, 2006 field report by a historical preservation architect.

“Retention of such architectural remnants has become fairly common around the country, leaving a bit of history standing near or becoming part of new structures,” the survey states.

The professional opinion by architect James T. Kienle also says:

“A compromise that recognizes the need to make the site safe and useable while preserving (its) unique Fairmont history would be to demolish all but the lower front facade (floors 1 and 2) which contains the most unique elements of the front elevation.”

City Council is expected to discuss whether to demolish the building at its meeting Tuesday night.

Prompted by the fall of a section of the parapet wall atop the roof late Monday afternoon and fears that the entire structure might collapse, City Manager Jim Snider placed a condemnation and demolition ordinance on council’s agenda.

Immediately after the parapet collapse was discovered, the city closed off the section of Everest Drive in front of the old hotel.

City firefighters have since maintained a round-the-clock guard on the building to keep pedestrians and drivers from getting near it.

The ordinance allows the city to take “immediate measures” to address the building’s dangerous conditions. It would permit the city to acquire the property from the Fairmont Renaissance Corp, Inc., the owner of the building. The city would then demolish it.

Snider said Thursday that the city wants to hear from the Fairmont Renaissance Corp. (FRC).

Laura Kuhns, the president and chief executive officer of the non-profit Vandalia Heritage Foundation, said Friday she is contacting FRC board members. Kuhns is also a FRC board member. Other members are: President Gerry Schmidt, Bruce McDaniel, Diane Floyd, Fran Whiteman, Nick Fantasia, Rich Wood and Sharon Shaffer.

The building was donated to the FRC in 2002, according to deeds in the Marion County clerk’s office. The Monongahela Lodge No. 148 of the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World Inc. bought the building on July 1, 1942.

But the lodge was unable to raise the funds to maintain the building and abandoned it in the early 1990s.

Kuhns said lack of money has also hampered the FRC, a community and economic group that Vandalia helped the city to establish. The Vandalia Heritage Foundation is a regional non-profit devoted to community and economic development and historical preservation.

Annual congressional earmarks that Congressman Alan B. Mollohan got for the VHF dried up in the aftermath of a 2006 controversy involving Mollohan.

Mollohan found himself under fire from two directions that year. A conservative watchdog group that year claimed the veteran congressman had failed to disclose the value of his real estate investments over an eight-year period. In addition, congressional use of earmarks which fall outside the normal authorization and appropriation review process became a hot election-year issue.

Mollohan’s use of earmarks to fund the VHF and four other non-profits he helped to start in the 1st Congressional District drew criticism by groups opposed to Congress’ right to make appropriations. Congressional leaders have since added more transparency to the earmarking process.

Kuhns said the VHF was planning to help the FRC accomplish preservation projects in the downtown historic district.

The VHF paid for the September 2004 architectural and structural engineering field survey of the building. The VHF also paid for a follow-up survey in July 2006, also by Kienle’s firm.

Both surveys were given to the city and to the FRC, Kuhns said Friday.

The reports state the building was abandoned in about 1989-1990.

Water damage from a leaky roof as well as lack of interior and exterior maintenance for many years are the reasons for its deterioration, the surveys states.

In the first survey in 2004, Arsee Engineers of Fishers, Ind. said the rotting of the interior wooden floors was such that “the potential for a more cataclysmic failure is quite real.”

Two years later, Kienle and Arsee Engineers were recommending the facade-only preservation.

E-mail Bill Byrd at bbyrd@timeswv.com.

        

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